LONDON (Reuters) -- Big-money institutional investors have turned more risk averse than at any time since August last year, taking positions they typically do not reverse quickly, State Street data showed Friday.

The U.S. financial services firm said its clients, who keep some $13.04 trillion with it as a custodian, have moved into what it called a "safety first" regime.

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This is characterized by moving from emerging to developed market equities, embracing bonds and unwinding currency "carry" trades.

Institutional investors tend to take a longer-term view of markets than other investors, so shifts in their strategy can have a significant impact on a market's recovery.

The firm said that since September last year investors had been taking positions reflective either of abundant liquidity or leverage opportunities.

.....very contrarian soon......my time horizon is over 10 years, while their time horizon is Monday......as an old stockbroker, I love it when the “fear” in the market sells off, once the panic stricken finally get out, the market will resume it’s upward momemtum.....fundamentals are good, psychology bad......have a beer and go fishing....

SAN FRANCISCO (Dow Jones) — Countrywide Financial Corp., the largest U.S. mortgage lender, said Thursday that “unprecedented” poor conditions in the secondary-mortgage market are causing it to retain a greater proportion of mortgage loans than it sells.

In a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission, Countrywide said that while it plans to retain more loans until investor demand improves, it warned that a prolonged period of poor conditions “could have an adverse impact on our future earnings and financial condition.”

The disclosure was made as part of Countrywide’s (CFC) regular quarterly financial report with the SEC.

In July, Countrywide indicated that widespread troubles in the sub-prime mortgage market have spread to higher-quality loans, when it announced its second-quarter results.

At that time, Countrywide said it expected the general slowdown in the housing market to last at least until 2009.

The “big boys” are frequently wrong. Many institutional money managers are younger folk who don’t have a lot of experience with market cycles(booms and busts). They also have many people looking over their shoulders. That doesn’t help.

Let the Fed bail them out, I don’t think so....Maybe they should ask their underpaid employees to help flip the bill.

From Washington Post, 12/15/2006
“...Both Wall Street firms also outlined their bonus scheme for the period, which was far below the $622,000 per employee being paid out by Goldman Sachs.

Lehman said it would pay its employees an average of $335,441 this year _ paying 25,936 workers a total of $7.7 billion in salary, bonuses and other benefits. At Bear Stearns, staff would receive an average of $321,740 in compensation.”

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